Giovanna Summerfield is Associate Professor of Italian and French at Auburn University, USA. Lisa Downward is Assistant Professor of Italian at Marist College, New York, USA.

"An essential book that re-orients thinking about a vexed literary genre, bringing out the Masonic background of the Bildungsroman and convincingly presenting the important contribution of women on its variable spectrum."

• 1. Introduction: The Concept of "Bildung"; Part I: Spirituality; 1. Mastery and Apprenticeship(s)-Departing from Goethe's Turm; 2. The British Master: Defoe and Dickens:; 3. The French Fellow Craft: From Voltaire to Stendhal; 4. The Italian Apprentice: Foscolo and Collodi; 5. From Bildungsroman to Bildungsreise; Part II: Gender; 6. The Dissolution of Gendered Plots: Wilhelm Meister and the Beautiful Soul; 7. Female Developments in the 19th Century: Charlotte Bronte's Jane Eyre, George Eliot's Middlemarch, Neera's Teresa, Lydia and L'indomani; 8. Female Developments in the 20th Century: Sibilla Aleramo's Una donna, Virginia Woolf's To the Lighthouse, Francesca Sanvitale's Madre e figlia and Susanna Tamaro's Va' dove ti porta il cuore; 9. The Bildungsroman as Spectrum; 10. Conclusion; Bibliography; Index.

Giovanna Summerfield is Associate Professor of Italian and French at Auburn University, USA. Lisa Downward is Assistant Professor of Italian at Marist College, New York, USA.

"An essential book that re-orients thinking about a vexed literary genre, bringing out the Masonic background of the Bildungsroman and convincingly presenting the important contribution of women on its variable spectrum."

• 1. Introduction: The Concept of "Bildung"; Part I: Spirituality; 1. Mastery and Apprenticeship(s)-Departing from Goethe's Turm; 2. The British Master: Defoe and Dickens:; 3. The French Fellow Craft: From Voltaire to Stendhal; 4. The Italian Apprentice: Foscolo and Collodi; 5. From Bildungsroman to Bildungsreise; Part II: Gender; 6. The Dissolution of Gendered Plots: Wilhelm Meister and the Beautiful Soul; 7. Female Developments in the 19th Century: Charlotte Bronte's Jane Eyre, George Eliot's Middlemarch, Neera's Teresa, Lydia and L'indomani; 8. Female Developments in the 20th Century: Sibilla Aleramo's Una donna, Virginia Woolf's To the Lighthouse, Francesca Sanvitale's Madre e figlia and Susanna Tamaro's Va' dove ti porta il cuore; 9. The Bildungsroman as Spectrum; 10. Conclusion; Bibliography; Index.